God of War director Cory Barlog joins Crystal Dynamics

Square Enix hires Barlog for new Tomb Raider and other projects

God of War director Cory Barlog is hoping to breathe new life into Lara Croft, as Square Enix studio Crystal Dynamics has just revealed that the industry veteran has joined its development team.

Barlog and the rest of the San Francisco-based studio will be working on a new Tomb Raider in addition to a "yet to be announced new title."

Barlog is best known for his work on Sony's God of War franchise. Following David Jaffe, Barlog served as writer/director for God of War 2, creative director for Chains of Olympus and he led story creation for Ghost of Sparta.

After leaving Sony, Barlog worked on a variety of projects as a consultant, designer, and writer, including a proposed Mad Max game.

"Crystal has pulled together some of the best teams in the industry to deliver against upcoming projects and future IP," said Darrell Gallagher, head of studio.

"Cory's heritage in building industry defining action adventure titles, together with our focus on delivering quality character driven blockbuster entertainment makes Cory a tremendously exciting addition to the team."

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Good luck Cory on your new career. A lot of leading names in the industry are moving to Crystal Dynamics. Not surprising as the new Tomb Raider is likely to be one of the biggest franchises over the next few years.

Apple HQ is based very close to Crystal Dynamics. If they invested some capital in CD and Square Enix I think that would be a shrewd move to help sell their product line. Even better - buy the franchise - they can afford it now they are worth more than $500 Billion.

Soul Reaver remake with the cinematic flair of God of War 2 -- please make it happen! I want a Soul Reaver reboot so badly.

Anyway, good luck to Cory. Crystal Dynamics seem to be a really exciting, progressive developer at the moment. I'm also interested to see what the new IP they talked about a month or two back turns out to be.